Beyond irresponsible owners - deadly dogs (long)

lilosophieAugust 21, 2012

The people across the road from my daughter have experiemented with "breeding guard dogs", crossed a Great Dane with a Bull Mastiff, then crossed that offspring with a pit-bull, ended up with large,viscioous dogs, un-altered, not socialized, no training. there are eight or so of those beasts on their premises, supposedlly always penned and locked up.

My daughter got ready for work this morning, put her dogs in their pen (a McNab and another cow-dog), opened her gate and got into her truck, didn't know that three of the neighbor's dogs had gotten off property until she felt herself grabbed by her leg and pulled out of the vehicle and dragged, two otherones joined the attacker and they started chewing on her, wisely she curled herself into a ball, protecting her face, belly and other vitals, then yelled for help.

Owners daughter came out and asked "are my dogs biting you?"

When they found out what was going on, they secured the dogs, Joann called her employer/friend who came and took her to Emergency.

The staff said they had not seen such severe dog-bites for quite a long time, Animal Control was notified, pictures were taken, Daughter's friend took some with her phone and Animal Control took some.

A/C knows of those people, they have been monitoring them quite a bit because of various animal abuse issues, such as not feeding their horses, they will file a criminal complaint about having the dangerous dogs running loose, are checking into the rabies vac status.

Now that family has several children, including a toddler, why would they "enjoy" having a pack of dangerous dogs around?

dear God in heaven!!! i am SO glad to know your daughter wasn't mortally wounded, which could have so easily happened! i cannot even begin to imagine what a dane/mastiff/pit cross would be capable of especially if these dogs are kept like they are and most especially since they are not spayed/neutered. this is just unbelievable!

if i were you, i would march straight into my prosecuting attorney's office and i would DEMAND that something be done. they can be charged criminally in a situation like this, you just have to have a DA with some balls that is willing to go after them with both barrels.

remember the diane whipple case in san francisco a few years ago? the young soccer coach who was attacked in the hallway of her building just inches from her own apartment door...she died of her injuries and the dogs' owners were charged with and convicted of FIRST DEGREE MURDER (although i believe the murder conviction was eventually lowered to a lesser charge, on appeal).

it boggles my mind that people would keep dogs like this. in fact, after i talked to my DA, i would march myself straight to the child protective services and report these people NOW, before their child is killed. it's inevitable, how sad!!!

please, please, please do whatever you can to make sure this doesn't happen again!

If Animal Control does nothing---it may be time to not only sue the owners, but the city as well. I do not say that lightly, especially since I have never initiated a lawsuit in the four or so times I was advised to do so---not nearly that kind of situation.

The people need to be arrested for harboring dangerous animals---a felony in my city and the dogs euthanized.

I love animals, but when dangerous ones are allowed to live, someone will ultimately suffer.

did I mention they may be dope dealers? That's the first thing that comes to mind for needing a pack of vicious dogs. Maybe they're trying to create a new breed of superkillers, that no bullet known to mankind can stop.
Some years ago, our next door neighbor's boyfriend/baddy daddy, got a presa canario (sp?) and then proceeded to leave the young puppy outside 24/7. I was less than excited when I realized it was the breed used to murder Diane Whipple. Lucky for us, they broke up & he took said puppy with him. She graduated to neglecting & abusing a sweet little cocker spaniel. But I took care of that situation for her.

I'm seconding handymac here, sue the homeowners AND the town if they won't take action. I bet she'll see some changes after she files a big suit against the homeowners, town and animal control officer.

Wow. Today is a disturbing day to be reading GW posts.
There was recently a case in my area where a dog bit someone - a way less serious case than your daughter's - and all of the dogs in their home were immediately euthanized. I believe it's the law. I would say that if you don't get immediate action from local animal control, that you go higher up in the law enforcement chain. I can't imagine how frightened your daughter must be. As for them having children, there are a lot of people that have child and after child and treat them horribly. I swear; the older I get, the more intolerable this world seems to get. Meanness and cruelty seems to be on the rise.

There is not going to be a lawsuit, Sheriff's department has a handle on the situation, Dogs have been surrendered and shall be euthanized, charges of keeping dangerous animals will be filed. The owners are well known to Animal Control, they moniter them frequently.
Daughter is sore, but she is resilient and doesn't let this overcome her.
I must explain we live very rural, our County is almost as large as the State of Delaware and sparsely populated, most of the inhabitants are self-reliant, Sheriff is doing a difficult job and doing is well.

it's so sad these dogs will lose their lives because of irresponsible owners but i don't see any other option that would be acceptable.

i'm glad to see something is being done. hopefully, these people will not be allowed to own more dogs after this.

i completely understand your living situation, it's much the same for me. when i moved out to the country 15 years ago, i can't even begin to tell you how many dogs and cats were dumped just at the end of my lane. people know me and know i'm a sucker for animals. however, i had my own pets and i was not prepared to take on their discarded dogs and cats so it was almost a weekly occurrence that a sheriff's deputy visited me to round up a dog. after a while, it stopped because i think people realized i wasn't falling for it. *sigh*

I'm going to agree here as someone who has worked animal control. You have got to "make someone hear your case". That means you have GOT to make the DA DO SOMETHING. They really won't unless you make them. Dog cases just simply don't get that much attention in the courts unless there is public pressure. I'm sure your local news might also be interested in your DA's reaction. You should reach out to them and ask them to follow the case.

It incenses me that someone would breed those 3 dogs with some sort of weird intent. It's criminal. Shame on them. Now you just have to convince a DA that its criminal.

Just so you get an idea what damage these animals did, it's now two weeks and the hematosa is still draining out, it is painful, but my daughter is trying to do whatever she does without taking medication.
Two of the dogs have been put down, the third one was released to the owners, because she did not have an attack history (?) but they are to pay a $500.00 fine, and I don't think they will be able to do that.
Animal Control is asking anyone in this area who sees any of the dogs (they have maybe six or more still on the premises) to call in if any of them are off their property.
Small town, those folks are "outsiders" everyone has stories about them, starving horses and other issues.
Letters to the editor in the local paper are appearing, going grocery shopping shows the support of the local residents, we are a little more careful of knowing where we are and all that.
We love our property and have lived here for over 30 years, don't feel we are the ones to have to move.
Cindymocha, yes, this is low priority for the DA - cannabis growers getting prosecuted bring revenue (forfiture law) to the County and there are Tweakers around giving lots of problems.
Popular support and publicity may change this.

When I lived in the sticks I had a neighbor who also cross bred various large athletic breeds and then treated them poorly so they were all just nutjobs when running free. I had to carry a weapon just to walk my dog down my driveway. Deer hunters used to complain about dog attacks while out hunting (mine was the closest house so I got blamed, but they understood when I showed who really owned the dogs). Most of them got shot when they started taking down horses. It was a gruesome summer. Before I moved out those neighbors were arrested for operating the largest Meth lab in the county. This type of person usually has some sort of tie to crime and its most often drugs.

O...M...G!!!!! that looks SOOOO painful!!! i can't even imagine. and this is two weeks later??? :(

if you don't know how to use a gun, LEARN! i'm not about shooting stray dogs but honey, if i were you and saw any of their dogs running loose, i wouldn't give it a second thought. this whole thing is just unbelievable.

i understand that meth labs and other illegal activities are a big problem (i work for a criminal defense attorney) but honestly, these dogs are potential killers.

i would still be hounding (no pun intended) your DA. i would be sitting on his doorstep and DEMANDING that more be done. when is this bozo up for re-election? sheesh, i just can't believe he won't charge them criminally!

Ouch - I am so glad your daughter wasn't hurt worse. Hoping for a speedy recovery for her. And a speedy resolution for the situation.

Not all owners of dangerous dogs are drug dealers - some are just stupid Jack As. I had a neighbor who had three large aggressive rescue dogs that we called animal control on repeatedly. They were truly loved by their clueless irresponsible owner. They were very good at escaping and would come and hangout in our cool entry and growl when someone attempted to leave the house. At the time my grandmother was 99+ years old and would take long very very slow walks - very nerve wracking. They went after a neighborhood kid on a bike and who was defended my GM's caregiver. Finally one of them bit someone in the face at a local park and were seized from the owner.

Now I have two neighbors with pit-bulls. One set of them chased my step-dad through the woods for miles while he was x country skiing. They then proceeded to run around the house he took refuge in and bang against the big glass doors. Of course when I met the same dogs with their owners who firmly believed that they were well behaved darlings.

and I get piled on here often for disliking/mistrusting pitts??? Wow, I'm really glad your daughter will recover from her horrendous wounds!

Now I'd love to hear someone come on back & 'correct' my strong dislike for their sweet bully breed dog. Oh, they're misunderstood, it's not the dog's fault, etc etc. Before you do, LOOK at the picture, yet another proof of the inherent violence of these bully breeds. This wasn't done by a golden, a poodle, or a chihuahua, it was a pitt. After watching one tear up my lhasa-poodle 15 yrs ago, I've had this funny distrust for them, odd I know.

whoa, nellie, back the truck up!!! they started out with a great dane/bull mastiff cross. trust me, danes and mastiffs, if not handled correctly and socialized till the cows come home, can be extremely dangerous animals! had they NOT crossed the resulting offspring with a pitbull, they STILL would have had vicious, dangerous dogs considering they obviously don't know how to handle large breeds safely.

i know at least a dozen pitbulls that are gentle, loving, devoted dogs. i also know of a few danes i wouldn't want approaching me unless i had a loaded cannon handy.

i'm sorry for your bad experience but you can't lump an entire breed into one horrible incident.

The three dogs attacking my daughter were not pit-bulls, though one was a cross-breed, the others were bull-mastiffs and great dane crosses. The important part is they are kept on property, are fed, interact with the family if they want to (it's their pack) but are not socialized, trained and know nothing, they are essentially feral dogs - and they were defintely out to kill my daughter.
The one pulling her out of her truck inflicted that bad bite (140# dog - 120# woman) but she had numerous bites all over - she made herself into a ball and yelled fo help
some of the owner's family heard and got the dogs off her.

OP's opening sentence, 'crossed a Great Dane with a Bull Mastiff, then crossed that offspring with a pit-bull, ended up with large,viscioous dogs, un-altered, not socialized, no training. there are eight or so of those beasts on their premises, supposedlly always penned and locked up'

bully breeds natch. One incident, that would be nice, lets ask the rest of the thousands of victims of bully breed attacks how they like them too. The fact is that this is yet another example of bully breeds doing what they were bred to do, hunt & kill (or maul in this case). Add in that many of the bully breed owners tend to resent authority figures and we have what is is pictured above. Yep it's all those goldens out there pulling women from their cars & trying to kill them, sure.

Our family adopted a 2 year old Yellow Lab from a humane society. They said he was a stray and had no info on him but that he was good with kids. We have three boys (7, 5, and 3) and my 3 year old just loved him. He was his buddy.

I was out of the room when it happened but from what my oldest son said, my youngest was snuggling with the dog on the floor and the dog jumped up and tore his scalp open. We had the dog for 3 weeks and this was a completely unprovoked attack from a YELLOW LAB. I can't imagine if he was a pit bull or another supposed aggressive breed. The crap people would have given us. Everyone that we have told always says, "Oh, but Yellow Labs are so friendly." Not always.

To the OP, I am very sorry about your daughter. I know exactly how you feel. Luckily (if you even want to say that) this was our animal and we had him put down so no third party was involved.

This was done by a YELLOW LAB. Just goes to show it's totally how you raise your pet.

Most breeds of dog were developed to "hunt and kill". Your argument doesn't stand, it's just targeting a group of breeds that you're discriminating against.

Any breed of dog can bite. Any breed of dog can have temperament and behavior issues. It's the Pit Bull's turn in the spot light. Other breeds had their turn and people were saying the same things about them then. But those other breeds aren't newsworthy anymore. People are only interested if it's a Pit breed.

The pitts belong in the terrier group, which generally were bred to hunt/kill. There are several other groups, which weren't bred to hunt or kill.

Yes, any breed of dog can have temperament & behavior issues. The problem being that when a bully breed has behavior 'issues' it can & often does maim terribly or kill. The child pictured above is an anomaly, in that 65-75% of maiming & killings are done by bully breeds.

Back in the day, dobes & GSD's were considered guard dogs & I recall a lot of stories of people getting bitten, sometimes badly, by those breeds. But those breeds don't KILL as often and can be pulled off their victims by their owner a lot easier than bullys, esp. pitts. There's no comparison in regards to the degree of damage pitts/bully breeds can do. I'm sure they're not all bad dogs & feel that mistreatment reinforces the inherent tendancy toward violence. So it's not the dogs fault but I still will never trust a pitt no matter what an owner says.

jomuir I am one who doesn't care for pits much as well even though I have seen plenty of them that seem like nice dogs. I don't care much for you lumping all the bully breeds into the category of dangerous though. My Boxer is a bully breed and the only thing dangerous about him is that he sometimes wants to get so close that he might knock a small child over. I don't let him around small children for that reason only, even though he loves kids.

Personally I think the issue with pits is the lack of proper breeding and handling. It is a fact that breeding programs for dogs have been successful in emphasizing some traits and eliminating others. So if a breed with powerful jaws and dogged determination is bred for aggressiveness generation after generation then I believe it becomes inbred. Unfortunately you have the backyard breeders breeding the dangerous/unstable bloodlines recklessly, people buying them and then not spaying or neutering then tons and tons of mistreated unstable dogs are everywhere. Meanwhile the show breeder who has bred their dogs for good temperment generation after generation are few and far between and their dogs are probably the nice stable ones we hear so much about. Unfortunately most of us don't know which is which. So I too am left not trusting pits too much either, on the side of caution. But I don't think the bullies who aren't bred intentionally for aggressiveness should be lumped into the same category as those who have been.

jomuir, besides your propensity towards discrimination, you're also showing ignorance. The point of fact is that most dogs have been bred for hunting, guarding and fighting. A lot of that involves killing.

Pits put up with a LOT of harsh treatment. Foolish, ignorant people think that they're a "tough" breed so they need "tough handling" when that's nonsense. Yet, pits are often subjected to this harsh handling, if not outright abuse, and they put up with it for a long time until they decide to put their foot down and say enough is enough. By the time it gets that bad, the dog is plenty defensive and ready to do damage. We all have our breaking points and since pits hold off for so long and theirs comes as such a sudden shift from their usual tolerance, people mistake these dogs as "suddenly snapping" and as "crazy" and "unpredictable".

The breeds I work with most are pit breeds. But I also with other breeds as well, all kinds. I work almost exclusively with rescue dogs and they come with the worse behavior and health problems imaginable. Rather than relying on second hand propaganda from the sensationalist news or what I've heard from an aunt's friend's brother's story, I rely on first hand experience with these dogs and FACT.

Most people don't know how to correctly interpret canine body language at the best of times and pit breeds can be harder than others to read due to their slight signals and physical alterations due to breed specifications. But they do give signals. And they're not anymore crazy or violent than any other breed, when it's just the opposite. They're willing to put up with more longer than other breeds would.

For for people who just know everything and in their hearts, they just know that the pit bull "breed" is evil, you also display your ignorance as it's not A BREED. It's breeds. And no, their jaws don't lock and they need to be socialized from a young age with other dogs just like any other breed does. Any breed of dog can become dog aggressive or people aggressive for any number of reasons.

That's all I'm going to say on the matter because I'm really quite tired of these pit bull hate parties all over the internet.

mm, there's a reason why there are 'hate parties' all over about your beloved pitts, they KILL in an amazingly higher proportion than other breeds. Many many of them are family pets where the owner knows the entire life history of the dog, yet still can't explain why it went after their kid, neighbor, other pets, ect. We will never agree, but please refrain from name-calling, I am firm in my opinion but respectful. Have a good day!

I have two Welsh Corgis, one Pembroke and one Cardigan, which I walk daily. There is a man in the neighborhood who walkes his American Bull Terrior. When we encounter him, it is all he can do to control his dog so it doesn't come after my Corgis. We live in an enclave neighborhood where many people walk their dogs or jog, so the aspect of encountering an aggressive breed concerns us all. By the way, the Corgis are members of the herding group whose members herd cattle and sheep and guard herds and flocks.

Just my opinion but this isn't a case of what breed it was, it's a case of what are the victims rights. The victim wants some justice. They want their DA and County Judge (what's his name and when is he up for re-election?) to stop treating these kinds of incidents like they are a huge inconvenience on their time.

I know for a fact that dog cases are often treated in local county courts like they are a huge inconvience to the local county court system - until it gets media attention. I'd post that picture of my daughter's leg (if it were me ALL OVER UTUBE until someone paid attention).

If the OP hasn't contacted an attorney and filed a civil lawsuit against the owners, why not???? There's such a thing as medical bills and pain and suffering involved. The owners should foot any and all bills incurred, even if it bankrupts them.

Having said that, I have been around some very friendly and socialized pitbulls. That's because the owners have properly trained them. I have a 70 lb Chow Chow that will lick you to death. And Chows were originally bred in China to be a "war dog". They went into battle with the armies.

i would definitely contact an attorney. there will be a statute of limitations (usually 2 years) in which to file a lawsuit against the owners. these cases are personal injury and are taken on a contingency basis where the attorney will get a portion (usually 1/3) of any settlement. even if these people don't have a pot to pee in or a window to throw it out of, they surely have home owners insurance which is what would cover your medical costs.

you may have to pay filing fees (maybe a couple hundred bucks) but there would be NO attorney's fees involved.